The Raven-Haired Rogue: A Novella

by John Zakour

  “Wipe that smug smile off your face, Zach. I will get through to him.”

  We are over the roof of the World Council building, and the drones have started their descent. At least the two drones beside us have. The one carrying me actually starts rising.

  “Ah, what gives, drone?” I ask.

  “I am going to a greater height,” the drone tells me.

  “Yeah, I see that, but why?”

  “I want to reach a greater altitude to assure your death when I crash myself to the ground.”

  OK, kinda sorry I asked that.

  “See, this is why you’re the last freelance PI on Earth,” HARV tells me.

  As the drone lifts me higher and higher, I make an attempt to reason with it. I pop my gun into my hand and wave it in front of the drone’s sensor.

  “Land now, or I blow you away,” I say in my best tough-guy growl.

  “Sir, I am planning on destroying myself as well as you, so your threat is truly an empty one. Either way you will die, and my mission will be accomplished.”

  “It’s got you there,” HARV tells me.

  “HARV—you still in communication with the other drones?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Using my right hand, I reach into my left-leg holster and pull out my good old-fashioned emergency knife. There are times when simple is best. Holding the top of the net and my gun with my left hand, I use the knife in my right hand to start cutting through the bottom netting.

  “You are lucky the World Council cut corners and skimped on the nano netting for these drones. They were more concerned about their looks and cost than function,” HARV tells me.

  “Well, it usually doesn’t make a lot of sense to cut yourself out of a net from two hundred meters in the air,” I say.

  “Good point.” HARV agrees. “Zach, not to state the obvious, but the fall from this height will still kill you, even with your body armor. So I am assuming you have some sort of plan.”

  “Yeah, as soon as I cut myself loose and start to fall, I want one of the other drones to catch me with its net and then guide me gently to the ground,” I say, cutting away.

  “Not exactly the best plan,” HARV notes.

  “Do you have another, HARV?”

  There’s a slight silence and then HARV concedes, “Continue to cut away.”

  “OK, HARV, the timing is going to have to be perfect here,” I say, preparing to separate myself from the drone.

  “Zach, I feel I must warn you the drones are not programmed to net falling targets. Running, yes. Falling, no.”

  “Falling is just vertical running,” I note. “Make the adjustments…” I think a moment more. “Oh, and make sure my bullet hits this drone. Can you do all that?”

  “Doesn’t really matter if I can or can’t, since you’re so committed to this plan,” HARV tells me.

  I cut out the bottom of the net and release my grip on the top, beginning my fall to the ground.

  I let myself free fall for a second or three and then fire my gun. There’s nothing left for me to do except fall and hope this plan works.

  Plummeting to the ground, I hear an explosion above me. I take that as a sign I have taken out the drone that wants to kill me. The ground is looming closer and closer. I feel something wrap around me. My descent slows. Something else wraps around me. My descent stops. I find myself engulfed in two nets, dangling a meter above the roof of the World Council building as drone debris litters the ground all around me.

  “You’re welcome,” HARV says. “I had both drones net you to compensate for your momentum.”

  My future mother-in-law, senior World Council member Helena Gevada, bursts through the roof door, followed by her two personal-guard bots.

  “Zachary, what are you doing destroying and misusing World Council property?” she demands.

  7

  “I repeat, Zachary, why did you destroy and reprogram World Council property?” Helena, demands as I dangle above her.

  “Remember, don’t be snarky,” HARV says in my head. “Helena is a powerful woman and Electra’s mom.”

  “I was bored. So for kicks I decided to destroy one of your drones and then free fall from it so your other two drones could catch me. I figured I’d bring some excitement to their boring drone existence,” I tell her.

  HARV sighes.

  Helena points to the top of the nets keeping me suspended in midair. “Cut him down,” she orders her guard bots.

  One of the bots extends a clawlike arm toward the net. The bot clips the net. I fall to the ground face first.

  “Thanks,” I groan. “Of course, I would prefer you didn’t have your drones try to kill me in the first place.”

  Helena offers me her hand to help me back to my feet. “Please, Zach, senior World Council members only get so many sanctioned kills. I wouldn’t waste one of mine on you.”

  Getting to my feet, I look her in the eyes. “That being said, somebody wants me dead.”

  “Zach, lots of people want you dead, but this isn’t about you,” Helena tells me.

  “She has a very valid point,” HARV chimes in.

  “I mean, somebody new wants me dead now that I am on the Merinda case.”

  Helena points to the door that leads off the roof. “Now enough of this tomfoolery with drones. Let’s go to my office where we can talk in private.” Helena leads me through the ornate halls of the World Council’s headquarters. Looking down at the marble floors, I say, “You certainly didn’t skimp when it came to this building.”

  “We on the council make important life- and world-changing decisions all the time. It is important that we are comfortable. Studies show that comfortable people make better decisions,” Helena says.

  “She’s right,” HARV agrees.

  I glare at him.

  I decide to walk the rest of the way in silence. After a few minutes, Helena opens the door to her office. The office is more spacious than my house. The wooden desk that dominates the middle of the room is larger than a city hover bus and seems to have been carved out of a redwood tree.

  “Nice place,” I say.

  “Zach, I am one of the most popular politician in decades. My approval rating is almost over twenty-five percent,” Helena says far more proudly than she should. “I deserve this office.”

  Helena sits behind her desk and motions for me to sit across from her. I do. She runs her hand over a sensor on the desk. A dome lowers from the cathedral ceiling.

  “So we can truly talk in private,” Helena says as the dome covers us.

  Helena sits there with her back arched until the dome locks in place. Then, “Zach, I consider this meeting with Merinda very important. Building a relationship between Mars and Earth would be beneficial to both our worlds. But Zach, I am much more open-minded and freethinking than my colleagues, hence my mass popularity and why—”

  “Get to the point, please, Helena.”

  Helena locks eyes with me. “If there was an attempt on Merinda’s life, it might have been sponsored by somebody here. I know a few council members who want to keep things status quo between Earth and Mars.”

  “Can you tell me which of your cronies you suspect?” I ask. I lean toward Helena. “I repeat, will you rat out your fellow council member or members? Who would want to see Merinda dead? How could they gain by hurting the Earth-Mars relationship?”

  Helena bends over the desk, grabs my collar, and pulls me toward her quite violently. “Zach! How dare you ask me that!”

  I keep calm. Locking my eyes on her, I raise a finger and say, “First, you’re the one who brought this up. I don’t have a lot of time to fool around, so yeah, I dare ask you.” I raise a second finger and tell her, “Second, while I don’t hit ladies, unless of course they are trained assassins and trying to kill me, I am not against shocking you.”

  Helena releases my collar and lets me drop to the chair. She sits back and smiles. “Just messing with you, my boy. I want to see what the man my daughter pl
ans to marry is made of.” Helena crosses her arms and looks at me smugly. “Not to throw mud, but I totally suspect it’s Sexy Sprockets.”

  I worked with Sexy a couple of times back in the day when she was a teenage rock star, before old age (turning twenty) forced her to go into politics. “Come on, Helena. Sexy is vapid and shallow, but she’s not a killer.”

  “She’s also the one politician in the world more popular than Helena,” HARV notes.

  Helena leans back deeper in her chair. “She spent a lot of years in the music industry. You don’t get more diabolical than music execs. Surely, some of that must have rubbed off on her.”

  I shrug. “So what would Sexy gain from disrupting the Earth-Mars relationship?”

  Helena returns my shrug with one of her own. “One of Sexy’s biggest backers is HyperUltraMaxMart. It would lose profit if Earth were suddenly flooded with handmade products from Mars.”

  “That is true,” HARV tells me in my head.

  “Well first, I can’t imagine HyperUltraMaxMart would lose that much profit. And second, I’m pretty sure it backs all you politicians.”

  “That is also true,” HARV says in my head. “This year alone, Helena has received over a million credits from HUMM.”

  Helena smirks. “Zach, what is this obsession you have with counting?”

  “Just answer the question, Helena.”

  She sighs. “Yes, HUMM does contribute to my causes, but I’m not the one who started the Earth First Act. That is being championed by Sexy and Councilman Sam Storm. If that bill passes, all products not made on Earth will be taxed three hundred percent.”

  “I’m sure you are familiar with Sam Storm. Before his political career, he was a pitcher for the Mexico City Padres,” HARV says.

  “I actually forgot all about Sam Storm since he retired from baseball,” I say.

  “He’s not one of the more outspoken World Council members,” Helena says. “But that doesn’t make him or Sexy any less calculating.” She pushes a button on her desk. The dome rises up off of us.

  At that moment, Sexy Sprockets comes bursting into Helena’s office. I swear her blond hair is longer than her red miniskirt and pink halter. Sexy stands there, arms crossed, stiletto boots tapping furiously on the ground. “Helena, Zachster, I demand to know why you are talking about me.”

  Helena holds open her palms to Sexy in a calming gesture. “Sexy, whatever makes you believe we were talking about you?”

  Sexy’s face turns red, matching her skirt. “Can the crap, Helena. Remember, I’m a psi with years in the music business. I can tell whenever somebody is saying bad things about me.” Sexy makes a fist and shakes it at us. “Now I demand to know what the DOS is going on here! I repeat, Zachy, I demand to know what the WTFing DOS you are doing here talking about me!” Sexy shouts.

  Years of being a PI have taught me you can learn a lot about a person watching how he or she reacts to a nasty truth.

  “I’ll tell you, as long as you promise never to call me Zachy again.”

  “Deal, Zach-attack,” Sexy says.

  “Wait, what?” Helena says, grabbing my arm.

  “She deserves to know,” I say, without looking back at Helena.

  Looking directly at Sexy, I tell her, “There was a threat on Merinda-1616’s life.” Yes, it’s a small spinning of the truth, but a spinning that fits my need. “Talking to Helena here, she thinks you might have a thing against Mars and Merinda. After all, you are one of the sponsors of the Earth First Act.”

  “What?” Sexy screams, her face now turning redder than her miniskirt. “How could you, b—!”

  Sexy leaps at Helena, grabs her, and they start rolling on the ground, exchanging physical and mental blows.

  “You tone-deaf bimbo. I’ll show you what pain really is!”

  “You’re just jealous of my youth and red-hot body!”

  “Oh please, why would I be jealous of a dumb, tone-deaf bimbo with no taste or style?”

  “Take that back! I have lots of style!”

  “HARV, are you recording this? It could come in handy in the future.”

  “Of course. Have you gotten what you need yet? Not to be a pest, but we really should be getting back to Merinda and Carol soon. After all, Merinda can’t keep her people looking much longer for a dog that we already found.”

  “Yeah, Sexy has nothing to do with this. I saw her made-for-HV special, Love Sucks at the Soul. She’s not nearly a good enough actress to pull off this kind of fake anger.”

  “I concur. I’ve run voice analyses on both ladies, and they seem to be telling the truth.”

  “OK, ladies, that’s enough!” I shout.

  I walk over to the two, who are still rolling on the floor pounding each other. Bending down, I pull Sexy off of Helena. Helena kicks at Sexy from the floor, but I block her kick. “That would have been a low blow, even for a politician,” I scold.

  I offer my hand to Helena. She accepts it, and I pull her to her feet.

  “I’m pretty certain neither of you has anything to do with the threat against Merinda,” I tell them. “Now I just need to talk to your fellow council person, Sam Storm, just to gauge if he has anything to do with this.”

  “Impossible,” Helena tells me. “He’s on a top-secret fact-finding tour.”

  Sexy nods. “Yep, we can’t just tell you where one of us really important people is.”

  “Well, it’s nice to know that you two can at least agree on something.”

  “We also agree that World Council members are vastly underpaid,” Sexy says proudly.

  “You got that right, sister,” Helena says, fist raised.

  Sexy turns to Helena. “You can’t believe how much more lucrative it was being a teen pop-rock idol slash goddess.”

  “Oh, I can believe it!”

  I cough. “Ah, ladies. I’m trying to prevent a murder here. So it would really help if you helped me.”

  The two ladies cross their arms and clamp their mouths shut. You didn’t have to be a PI to know they weren’t going to tell me anything.

  “Look, ladies, I know you are busy politicians,” I say, putting air quotes around the word busy. “But I need to question Sam Storm—see if he might be involved in this.”

  The two stare at me, hands on hips.

  “Zachy, you know we can’t do that,” Sexy says. “It would be bad form.”

  Helena nods. “For one of the few times in my career, I agree with Sexy.”

  “In that case, you ladies leave me no choice.” I turn my wrist communicator toward them. “HARV, play the video.”

  The holographic image of Helena and Sexy rolling on the floor trading blows appears.

  “I look good on top,” Sexy says with a smile.

  “You two don’t want this to go public, do you?” I say.

  Sexy shrugs. “Oh, Zach-man, my fans—I mean voters…I mean constituents—love me no matter what I do. If anything, they will just complain we weren’t doing it in mud.”

  “She’s got you there,” HARV whispers to me.

  I set my sights on Helena, zeroing in on her. I ask, “What about you? Wasn’t your last slogan ‘The most distinguished politician in the worlds’?”

  Helena sighs. “Sam is stepping down from politics at the end of the month. He’s tired of all the red tape. But he wants to go out with a bang, so he’s on the moon trying to work out a new trade deal with them.”

  “But why sponsor the Earth First Act, then?” I ask. “Products from the moon would be heavily taxed.”

  “Sam is trying to work out a deal where Earth would annex the moon and the moon would become part of Earth,” Helena says.

  “That’s crazy!” I say.

  Sexy nods. “Yep, Zachy-poo, I agree.”

  Helena holds her ground. “Obviously, for those on the moon, their fierce love of independence makes it a difficult task to accomplish, yet it would certainly be a great start to his new career in the private sector. It’s a win for everybody.”


  “Everybody except Mars,” I point out.

  Helena shakes her head. “It sets a precedent for them to become part of Earth, too.”

  OK, this wasn’t exactly what I was expecting, but this could be a good break. I have dealt with the people of the moon on a number of occasions. I have one very good contact there: Elena Sputnik. Elena is a high-level psi whom I have fought against and with. She is fiercely loyal to the moon, where she is on its ruling council. She would certainly know what Sam Storm is up to there.

  “HARV, make contact with Elena. Tell her I need to see her ASAP.”

  “Done, Zach.”

  “Let me know when you have a response, HARV.”

  A bright, human-size ball of energy appears in the middle of the room.

  HARV points at the crackling ball. “I think her response is coming.”

  The ball of energy fizzes away. There stands Elena Sputnik in all her glory: sparkling-green eyes; long, blue hair; a smooth, peach complexion—all somehow perfectly complemented by a purple dress and knee-high purple boots.

  “You called?” Elena says.

  Sexy and Helena are quick to react.

  “Elena, baby, I so love those boots, but this is so uncool coming in unannounced!” Sexy scolds.

  “This is a brazen breach of protocol!” Helena shouts at her.

  Elena points at the two lady politicians. “Mute and pause!” she orders.

  The two freeze in place.

  Elena blows on her index finger and then lowers it. “I love doing that,” she giggles. “Now, Zach, you called?”

  I look at the two frozen politicians. I turn to Elena and decide to just get to the point. “Elena, I need you to tell me what you know about Sam Storm.”

  She shrugs. “He’s a boring windbag who loves the sound of his own voice.”

  “Yeah, he’s a politician, so that goes without saying. I need to know how his negotiations with the moon are going,” I prompt.

  Elena laughs and waves at me with a dismissive hand. “Oh, silly Zachary. There were no negotiations. Yes, Storm did come to us about a month ago, but we totally shot down his agenda. We on the moon have no love for Mars, but we certainly aren’t going to strike an exclusive deal with Earth. We don’t exactly trust you guys, either. Many of you are jealous that our entire female population and some of our male population are psis.”